I smiled at her. “Yeah, I’m looking for Romeo. Is he around?”
“I’m sorry, but Romeo isn’t available right now. May I ask what your name is? I can take a message for you and be sure to pass it through to his PA.”
“I really need to speak to him urgently. Is there any way you could get a message through to him now? I’ll wait if I have to.”
The girl scanned my eyes, then Draven’s. To her, his eyes wouldn’t be the black pools I was used to—they’d be dark, possibly deep brown, but they’d look entirely human. This moment on hesitation on her part was enough for me to pick up that there was more to this than met the eye. I decided to press a little further.
“Is Romeo okay?” I asked, concern that was all too real showing on my face.
“Mister Romeo is unavailable,” she repeated, “If I could take your name and a message down, I can make sure that he gets it when he returns.”
Before I could say anything further—better yet, before Draven could pressure the poor girl anymore than she already was—one of the doors behind the reception desk opened and a man tentatively walked through. He was a big guy wearing the frame and face of a boxer, and a black suit that made him look like more than just hired muscle.
“Everything okay, Shanti?” he asked as he moved a little closer to the reception desk. Right away I felt the instinct to either fight him, or run away from him. It was an animal thing, part of my lizard brain or whatever it is humans called it. With this instinct bubbling up, I knew, this man was some kind of supernatural—probably a mage, given where we were.
Lucky for me I’d been living with Bastet for a while, and I’d developed a little immunity to the urges that came with meeting a native for the first time.
“Yeah, everything’s fine,” Shanti said, “This is… I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name.”
“Seline,” I said, “I’m looking for Romeo. Is he around?”
The boxer glanced at the receptionist, who looked easily to be about half his size. He then turned his eyes on me, gestured with his head toward the door he’d just stepped through with his hand, and nodded. “Come with me,” he said.
I followed him through the door and into a quiet corridor. I must’ve walked past three recording studios, all empty, before we were finally brought to what looked like a small lounge. There were couches here to relax on, a coffee table covered not in magazines, but in tablet computers each flashing with a different music video.
The boxer gestured to the couches, and I sat beside Draven. “Is everything okay?” I asked.
“Your name is Seline, right?” the boxer asked as he sat down.
“That’s right.”
“My name’s Mercutio. I don’t know much about you, but I know you and Romeo have been in contact before—more than once.
Mercutio. The word burned on my tongue, waiting for me to set it loose and ask why? Was it a coincidence? Had they planned to name themselves after Shakespearean characters? Were they being ironic, or did they really enjoy Shakespeare?
“We have,” I said, composing myself. “We’ve done business before. Where is he? I really need to speak with him.”
He paused. “I was hoping you could tell me.”
I frowned at him. “What?”
“None of us have seen Romeo in days. He ain’t answering his cell, he hasn’t been home, hasn’t checked into any of the hotels he likes. He also hasn’t boarded any planes or boats that we know of. He’s just disappeared.”
“Disappeared…” I looked across at Draven, then back at Mercutio. “When was the last time you saw him?”
“Four days ago. He was in there, busting out a new track. After he was done, he listened to the track getting mixed, then he headed into his office to make a phone call. I left him alone for the most part, but when I went in to bring him his caviar and chili fries, he wasn’t there. No one had seen him leave.”
“Were there any signs of a struggle in his office? Forced entry or exit?”
“There’s only one way into or out of his office unless you know magic, and that’s through a single door.”
I stared at him. “You’re a mage…”
Mercutio nodded. “That’s how we know he’s missing, missing. We’ve tried looking for him using magic, but we keep getting blocked out like someone’s hiding him from us.”
“Is it possible he’s hiding himself from you?” Draven asked.
“Don’t see why. We’re his people, his crew. This isn’t like him. Everyone’s pretty shook up. I know him and you have been in contact… did he tell you he was going anywhere?”
I shook my head. “Romeo and I have done business, but we’re hardly at the point where we tell each other what our schedules are like. He didn’t say anything to me about wanting to go anywhere… do you mind if I look at his office?”
“There’s nothing to find there, we’ve looked. The only thing we found was a garbled voice message he left. Couldn’t make sense of it.”
“Wait, he called his own office phone and left a voicemail?” Draven asked. “Do you still have it?”
“We stored it, yeah. We’ve been analyzing it using the equipment here, trying to filter out some of the voices we heard. No one we recognize.”
“Do you mind if I take a listen?” I asked.
Mercutio stood and opened the door. “Go right ahead. It’s down the hall, follow me.”
“I don’t like the sound of this,” Draven said, keeping his voice low.
“I don’t either,” Mercutio said. “I didn’t know Romeo too well, but I could tell he loved this place, his music, and probably his people, too. I don’t think he’d have just up and disappeared like that.”
“We’re running dangerously close to being in over our heads here. I don’t think we should pursue this, not with Valoel possibly on the hunt for you right now.”
I shook my head. “The only reason Valoel knew where I was last night was because he’d been told, and I need Romeo if I’m going to have a shot at unlocking more of my memories in a hurry. We need to find him, and we need to do it fast.”
Draven sighed. “Mages make me jittery.”
“Feeling’s mutual,” Mercutio said. He was a good few feet ahead of us, but he could clearly hear us talking.
“He didn’t mean it like that,” I said, trying to salvage the situation a little. The last thing I wanted was to start a fight with a mage over a misunderstanding.
“Don’t worry about it. Just because your kind makes me jumpy doesn’t mean I haven’t learned to live with you. Guess that’s the difference between me and most.”
Mercutio pushed open a door to a room that looked like a miniature space center. There were computers everywhere, panels covered in dials and knobs, and monitors showing tracks, times, and wavelengths. This is where the magic happens, I thought as I walked deeper into it. This was where rough tracks straight from the studio were cleaned and cut into real diamonds.
“Over here,” Mercutio said. He was leaning over a computer and tapping the screen with his giant fingers.
I watched him pull an audio file up onto the main display. When it opened, it translated onto the program as a wobbling line going along a track. Mercutio hit play, and the audio message started playing. It wasn’t long, barely seven seconds worth, but every second was a nightmare of chaotic sound that made no sense at all.
It sounded like Romeo had unintentionally called his office; or maybe intentionally, if he’d been taken by someone and used the speed-dial function on his phone instead of typing out a number. Inside of the message I could hear voices, wind blowing, and something constantly brushing up against the microphone. It was difficult to make anything out with any clarity, though.
When it finished playing, Mercutio played another file. “This is the one we cleaned up a little.”
“Convenient that you have a sound studio,” Draven said.
“Yeah, pretty useful, although I can’t say it happens often.”
The reco
rding started playing, and immediately I noticed the difference. It was way easier to listen to, the chaos having died down to a low hum in the background. It still sounded like something was brushing up against the microphone, and while there were people talking somewhere, what they were saying was difficult to make out.
“Far as we can tell,” Mercutio said, “That’s Romeo talking right here.” He pointed at the track line, following it with his finger as it moved. I could hear Romeo’s voice, it definitely sounded like his phone was in his pocket; it also sounded like he was talking to someone. He wasn’t struggling or fighting, he wasn’t screaming for his life—he was having a casual conversation about…
“Is he getting ready to fight someone?” I asked.
“That’s what it sounds like… like he’s psyching himself up for a fight.”
“Maybe he’s talking to himself, and what we’re hearing is an echo,” Draven said.
I shook my head. “No, that’s another voice right there. Is there any way we can enhance it?”
“We’ve tried. This is about as clear as we can get it.”
I spotted a pair of headphones hanging off a clip and I picked them up. “Could you play it on these?”
I slid the headphones over my ears and listened closely as the message started playing again. Gibberish. I wasn’t having much luck with it, although the second voice was starting to sound familiar.
“Play it again,” I said, even though I couldn’t really hear myself say it through the headphones.
When the audio came around again, I concentrated heavily on that second voice, trying to pin it down. I’d heard that voice, I knew I had. I asked Mercutio to play the message again, and again. I could see the impatience building on Draven’s face, but I was almost there, I could almost place the voice I was hearing.
“Holy shit,” I said, pulling the headphones off my ears.
“What?” Draven asked.
“It’s Darkshard. Romeo is with Darkshard!”
“Are you sure?”
I couldn’t believe it had taken so long for me to remember the voice of the guy who’d made Draven jealous, but I had it now. “I can bet my life on it. Wherever Romeo is, or wherever he was when this message came through, he was with Darkshard.”
“Who the fuck is Darkshard?” Mercutio asked.
“Some other mage we know,” I said.
“Is Romeo in danger?”
I took a breath. “That I don’t know. He could be, but then again maybe not. Darkshard’s a shady character, though, and he’s working with a world-class asshole. If Romeo is there against his will, then yeah, he’s in danger.”
“But he was able to make a phone call,” Draven said, “And it came through yesterday. If he was there against his will, they’d have taken his phone from him.”
Mercutio straightened out. “Look, if my boy is in trouble, it’s my job to get him out of it. That’s how it’s always been.”
I turned to look at the much larger guy. “And I get that, but the situation’s… really delicate. We have no idea where Darkshard is, only who he could be with. If he’s with the guy I think he’s with, then we’re going to need to be really subtle about what we do next. The last thing we want to do is attract attention when we mount a rescue.”
Draven’s eyebrows arched up. “So, this is a rescue mission, now?”
“Of course it is. Romeo needs our help. I refuse to believe, after everything he told me, that he’d suddenly side with Valoel and Darkshard. Something happened to him, and somehow, he managed to call for help. We need to answer that call.”
“I don’t like the sound of any of this.”
“I don’t either, but we have a responsibility, Draven… and we need him, remember?”
“Hey, now,” Mercutio interrupted, “You guys aren’t going to do anything to him when you find him, are you? You aren’t bounty hunters or anything?”
I shook my head. “Romeo has something I need. If he’s in trouble, I want to get him out of it so he can help me. Trust me, I don’t want to see him hurt anymore than you do.”
He took a deep breath, filling his substantial chest with air. “What can I do?”
“Good question… I need to figure that out. Just because I know who Romeo is with doesn’t mean I have any idea where they are, but I do know where we can start.”
“Oh yeah? Where?”
“The Glittered Goddess.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Romeo’s bodyguard, Mercutio, insisted on coming with us, and that was only going to cause problems. Having a mage working so closely with us—with Draven—didn’t sound like a good idea. Not to me, anyway. Draven disliked mages, didn’t trust them, and I couldn’t blame him.
Mages were notoriously shifty characters, especially when it came to finding some new morsel of knowledge. If they couldn’t bribe the information out of someone, they’d use invasive magic to pry it out of them. That made being friends with a mage, or even trusting them, very difficult; especially if you were an alien from another dimension, which Draven and I were.
Mercutio, however didn’t seem too interested in pulling us apart one thread at a time to learn what we were made of. His concerns were more in the immediate, in finding his friend and bringing him home safe. I could tell the anxiety of trying to find Romeo and failing at every turn had started to get to him, even though I’d only known him for a short while.
I felt for him, could sympathize with him, and I guessed that was why I couldn’t say no to bringing him along. Luckily, the Glittered Goddess wasn’t far from Romeo’s studio. By the time we arrived, the lights were on, the door was open, and clientele were steadily trickling into and out of the place.
The bouncer standing guard in front of it, a tall, bald, built like a house kind of guy, eyed us from behind deep shades that reminded me of Crag. A little pang of hurt came up as I remembered the way he’d sacrificed himself so others could live.
It felt like a lifetime ago that happened.
He didn’t ask us for ID, or if if we were on a list—this club wasn’t that kind of place. It was, however, the kind of place run by a mage, and that meant suspicions were high from the moment he’d set his eyes on us. He put his hand out in front of Draven, stopping us all in our tracks.
“What do you want?” the bouncer asked.
Draven glanced at me, then back at the bouncer. “To see some naked women,” he said.
“She here to watch women dance, too?”
“A girl can’t appreciate the feminine body?” I asked.
One of two things was happening. If he was a mage, he was surely scanning us, trying to figure out what we were. I had a feeling that probably wasn’t a very quick process, hence the stalling us with idle conversation. If he wasn’t a mage, though, then was genuinely thrown out by a woman entering the strip joint. It said a lot about the kind of place this was if a woman walking through the door to watch, instead of to dance, was enough to rouse suspicion.
The bouncer eventually let us through. He either wasn’t a mage, or he wasn’t good at scanning us for strangeness, but he let three supernaturals walk into the place like nothing was up. Trap? Naturally that was where my mind went, and it was entirely possible Darkshard had given his people a description of me and instructed to let me right into the lion’s mouth.
If this was a trap, though? Well, that just meant I’d have to get my hands dirty to get out, and I didn’t have a problem with that.
As soon as I walked in, I was hit by a barrage of smells. Perfume, alcohol, sweat, testosterone, and even baby powder. The Goddess was dark inside, all of the walls covered in what looked like reflective tinsel that sparkled under the constantly strobing lights. Aggressive rock music blared out of the speakers, and on the main stage, a girl barely out of her teens and clad only in underwear was giving one hell of an acrobatic display on a pole for all to see.
It was impossible to tell whether Draven’s eyes were wandering, but then what did I care if they did, rea
lly?
“We need to get into the back,” I said, “You go to the bar and get a drink or something, I’ll try to find the entrance.”
“Why you?” Mercutio asked.
“Because I won’t be stopped by girls looking to take me into the champagne room.”
Okay, that logic wasn’t entirely sound. One, I had just as much of a chance as they did at getting stopped. And two, the odds of them being approached at the bar was super high. What I wanted to do was get into the back on my own, without the two of them. The last time I spoke to Darkshard was moments before a fight. Things hadn’t exactly gone well. But I was pretty sure he still wanted to get me in the sack, and I was going to use that to my advantage.
“Alright,” Draven said, “We’ll be over there, but don’t do anything crazy.”
“Is that something she usually does?” Mercutio asked.
“Don’t answer that,” I said, before Draven could speak. “Just make sure no big looking dudes suddenly rush into the back behind me, okay?”
Draven nodded, and our single group broke off into two. I watched them head over to the bar as I meandered my way around circular tables all arranged in front of the stages. Waitresses wearing little more than g-strings and nipple tassels moved around me bringing drinks to a large booth filled with businessmen.
The MC’s voice suddenly filled the room, busting through the speakers above the sound of the music playing.
“Gentlemen, please give it up for Kandi. And that’s Kandi with a K and an I so you know she’s willing to get freaky!”
The girl on stage—Kandi—made eye contact with me while she danced. Her body was snakelike, fluid in the way it moved and writhed around on that stage. Even in stiletto-heels she could do things with her body I probably would’ve struggle to do barefoot.
Then came the moment I knew I was being scanned. It hadn’t been the bouncer at the door, or the guy behind the bar; it was the stripper. Hers were the eyes that fell on me, hers were the magic senses now probing my body, looking for answers to the questions she was asking. It didn’t take long before she knew. I didn’t really have a way to defend myself against a magic scan, not that I knew of anyway.
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